I would play "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" on repeat as a young boy, but I didn't begin digging deeper until my Dad began blasting Modern Times every weekend during my teenage years.

Although, at the same time, in a roundabout way, it was Pearls Before Swine's recording of "I Shall Be Released", which I thought was an original when I first heard it, that first got me to looking for more Dylan material, once I found out that this sublime song was a cover of his.

Manchester University 1995. Not a specific song, but my friend introduced me to "The Freewheelin'" and after that first time I always put in on when I visited him in his room. It's not my favourite Bob album, but it'll remain special to me. "Bob Dylan's Dream" also describes how I feel about my uni days:

I wish, I wish, I wish in vainThat we could sit simply in that room againTen thousand dollars at the drop of a hatI'd give it all gladly if our lives could be like that

Joined: Wed June 6th, 2007, 20:48 GMTPosts: 9342Location: In the land of the midnight sun

SirDogg wrote:

Hurricane

I remember this was a few months before Modern Times came out.I must have heard LARS, BITW and the other greatest hits before Hurricane,but that song made me want to listen more closely to his back catalogue.And I immediately fell in love with Modern Times went it was released.

I know it seems a 'cop-out' but if I say I really don't remember which was the first song that turned me on to Dylan all I can say is read on. I was a real sixties music fan, I really liked The Beatles and The Stones but then I started to become aware of songs like Peter, Paul and Mary's 'Blowin In The Wind', The Byrds 'Mr. Tambourine Man', Manfred Mann's 'Just Like A Woman' and Julie Driscoll's 'Wheels On Fire'. Of course there were others, but by the time I realised they were all written by one man and had bought the original Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits Vol 1 I really couldn't tell you which was the first song to convert me into becoming a lasting Dylan fan.The one song that really stood out for me on Greatest Hits was Positively 4th Street, I hadn't really heard it much before and it's still one of my faves from that period. Of course the album is packed with other goodies but really the first song may not even have been sung by Bob Dylan.

1965 - attending high school in Dothan, Alabama, where I felt totally alone and out of it (believe me - if you were there, you would have felt the same way). I heard this song and I couldn't understand the lyrics at first - but, God, when I did - !! I thought that at last there was someone else out there who understood. It was the first song that "turned me on" to Dylan - however, I didn't become 'obsessed' for another 40 or 50 years -

Ah, you've been with the professors and they've all liked your looksWith great lawyers you have discussed lepers and crooksYou've been through all of F. Scott Fitzgerald's booksYou're very well-read, it's well-knownBut something is happening here and you don't know what it isDo you, Mr. Jones?

"Lay, Lady, Lay" when a man I was contemplating having an affair with--brought it to my place and we danced to it. He did say, referring to Dylan, "I think you're going to like this" likely knowing it was an understatement.

Dylan was always around when I was growing up. I didn't really like him, but I liked Mr. Bojangles.As a teenager I started to actively dislike Blowing in the Wind, Mr. Tambourine Man, The Times They Are A-Changing, Love Minus Zero/No Limit, because of the way they were sung at campfires, and the way the music teacher at school just assumed we would like any song that was played at campfires.Then, at about 22, there was a very short period where I was first turned on. But which song was it? As I said, Dylan was always around, I even played his records from time to time, even if I wasn't turned onto Dylan yet.Maybe Bye and Bye, specifically the verses "The future for me is already a thing of the past. You were my first love and you will be my last"Maybe it was "The sun's not yellow, it's chicken" or "I wish I could write you a melody so plain that could hold you, dear lady from going insane".It's very possible that it was Like a Rolling Stone, specifically the flawlessness, the energy, the truthfulness of the singing (more than the words).It could have been the lyrics to Ballad of a Thin Man.Maybe it was Hendrix' version of All Along the Watchtower.Or maybe it was the line "I was all right 'till I fell in love with you"In any case, something hooked me and it went very fast.The moment I was completely converted was when I started listening to Blonde on Blonde. I had heard it hundreds of times, but suddenly I heard something that I assume is the thin wild mercury sound. From that moment on I think I played Dylan literally* every day for a year and literally** every day for about seven years.

Blowin' In The Wind probably. Impossible to remember which one really. Thank you Peter, Paul, and Mary.

Later, maybe the first one I really loved was Positively 4th Street?

Pivotal for me was hearing (most of) Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues on the radio, not knowing the title either, the song really blew my mind, it was so incredible.The lines "Up on Housing Project Hill, it's either fortune or fame/you must pick one or the other, though neither of them are to be what they claim" just amazed me.I knew the Greatest Hits album would clearly not be enough then.

Not the first one i heard, as i know i dont remember the first dylan song i heard. I have picture of me as a 3 year old playing a harmonica next to a picture of bob. But Lily Rosemary was my favourite when i was wee the fast tempo i used to dance to, my dad used to sing forever young to me when i was a baby to put me to sleep.

My mum is a Dylan fan so I grew up listening to him, one of my earliest memories is sitting in the car in my booster seat aged four or five with Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands on and wondering what Arabian drums were and wishing I had some. He made them sound so cool!

I’ve gone through a few phases since the age of 10 where he was my favourite artist for a year or two at a time, but I didn’t make an effort to listen to his post-90s or his lesser known albums until last year. Didn’t help that the Essential Bob Dylan album I had at the time contained very few of his 90s onwards songs (from what I recall just Things Have Changed and Not Dark Yet). I became absolutely hooked after listening to Modern Times last year though, no particular song sealed it for me, I was just gobsmacked at what a perfect album it was in my eyes when I must admit I had just assumed he was a bit of a has-been - let’s face it, almost everyone else with such a long recording career peaked a long time ago and their modern stuff is largely drivel so my cynicism wasn’t without precedent. After that point I made it a mission to listen to all his albums and approach them with an open mind.

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